CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.

* There is a vast world of reality into which science can no more enter than an elf can be Santa Claus. We regret to observe that rather than face it, and confess its inability to measure it, science turns its back upon it. Life is not always every-day life, and the insolvable mysteries are correlated not to formal rules but to spirit and inspiration. Are bits of wisdom liable to dwarf the subject? Indeed — and rightly! James Howell described the ingredients of a good proverb to be "sense, shortness, and salt." May Howell's cry resound through this present collection of maxims on believing in one's elf.